Last year, in our inaugural survey research to check the pulse of the shipping landscape, one finding in particular pointed to a sea change in how carriers and shippers work together. A full 91% of respondents indicated that they planned to expand their carrier networks in the year to come. Shippers were clearly looking for more options to manage costs and risk.
Fast forward to 2026. For our second annual report, we commissioned researchers at Incisiv to dig into a shipping landscape that even on the surface is more complex, more dynamic and less forgiving than it was a year ago. The State of Enterprise Shipping 2026 surveyed leaders in six industries: apparel and footwear, automotive, life sciences, manufacturing, retail, and the 3PLs that serve them.
The findings show that the rules of the game, and the strategies of the players within it, have changed. What is remarkable is not just the extent of the changes – we’re talking about the upending of long-established norms – but how quickly they occurred.
For years, if you signed a good contract, held your carrier to it, effectively factored general rate increases into your budget, and negotiated exceptions for deviations that came up or lay hidden in the fine print, you had the foundation for an effective program. Decades-long carrier relationships often resulted.
But in recent years carriers began to rely more on accessorial charges – among them fees and surcharges for delivery areas, address corrections, and fuel – to drive revenue. Introduced with unprecedented frequency and often with little warning, such charges are now a preferred lever for increasing revenue-per-package and they force shippers to take proactive action to maintain even basic control over costs.
A fundamental change is to blame. Carriers that for years pushed to gain market share now only want the shipments which are most profitable in their networks, which brings us to today.
Carriers rarely want all of your shipping business.
Carriers’ pricing strategies today make it clear that they rarely want all of an organization’s shipping business. That is why businesses must work with an ever-growing community oftransportation companies to get the job done, a reality that requires the ability to match the right parcel with the right carrier, and to manage the complexities a multi-carrier approach introduces.
The good news is that The State of Enterprise Shipping 2026 uncovered some positive developments. First, it shows that shippers wasted no time expanding their networks as they said they would last year:
●More than half, 56%, of shippers now manage three or more parcel carriers; and
●Almost a quarter, 22%, manage six or more.
Just as importantly, most respondents indicated they have the most fundamental capabilities needed to work with multiple carriers, with 75% able to automate carrier selection to match the right package with the right service. A majority, 87% are also able to analyze shipping spend at the carrier level. But unfortunately, there is also less positive news to report.
Carriers changed how they do business. Most shippers have not.
While most respondents invested in analytics, automation and multi-carrier capabilities, 41% still rely on manual intervention, periodic reviews and historical reporting to make decisions. Only 38% can evaluate costs at the package or SKU level, a limitation that practically guarantees unknown overages that impact margins and that some items are shipped at a loss.
And most alarmingly, the majority – 86% – do not have insight into current conditions, a risky reality when new surcharges, rules, and fees can dramatically impact what it costs to ship a parcel in the blink of an eye. Simultaneously, only 15% of respondents can calculate shipping costs in real time.
The research clearly shows a sector in change, but what is most striking is not the challenges shipping organizations face, or even the technologies needed, but rather the need to execute shipping operations in a new way – one that takes into account the dramatic shift in how carriers now conduct business.
See The State of Enterprise Shipping 2026 research report to learn more. PARCEL’s readers are also invited to take the Shipping Intelligence Maturity Assessment, a quick 12 question assessment, to benchmark their own shipping operation against those surveyed and learn how to improve their ranking among peers.
Josh Dunham is the co-founder and CEO of Reveel, known for its Shipping Intelligence Platform.
